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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/24913057">A Bitter Little Eucharist</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/stonecoldhedwig/pseuds/stonecoldhedwig'>stonecoldhedwig</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Miracles [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Alcohol, Alternate Universe - Canon, Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Canon-Typical Violence, Character Death, Grief, Harry Potter is Not the Boy-Who-Lived, Healing, James Potter is the Boy Who Lived, Marauders, Multi, Wrong Boy-Who-Lived (Harry Potter), jily, wolfstar</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-06-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-06-25</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-04 04:08:12</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>No Archive Warnings Apply</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>2,983</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/24913057</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/stonecoldhedwig/pseuds/stonecoldhedwig</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>"He was doing this for James, Sirius reminded himself. James needed them to be standing at this grave in the early morning light, pouring their hearts out to a cold stone. Sirius didn’t understand that, but he knew that this was what his brother needed; and what James needed, Sirius would move mountains and part oceans and catch constellations in pursuit of."</p><p>-----</p><p>The first in a new Miracles series about James as The Boy Who Lived.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>James Potter/Lily Evans Potter, Sirius Black/Remus Lupin</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series:</b></td><td>Miracles [1]</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Series URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/series/1802782</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>8</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>38</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>A Bitter Little Eucharist</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>This is the prologue for a much longer fic I'm working on about James as the Boy Who Lived, beginning at the start of Harry's fourth year at Hogwarts. There's angst, there's Wolfstar, there's a Triwizard Tournament...</p><p>I am also fickle and *had* to upload this, so there you go.</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>
  <strong>October 31, 1982</strong>
</p><p> </p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Are you ready?” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">It was still dark outside. Remus leant against the wooden doorframe, looking down at Sirius. He was already dressed to leave the house—shabby wax jacket buttoned up, knitted scarf tucked into the fraying collar. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Yeah, just… give me a minute.” Sirius scrubbed a hand over his face. Beneath his fingertips, he felt the rough prickle of his morning stubble along the sharp line of his jaw. He squeezed his eyes shut, exchanging the darkness of the room for the constellations behind his eyelids. <em>Breathe, Sirius</em>, he thought. <em>Breathe</em>. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Sirius.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">He opened his eyes. Remus had crossed the room and knelt beside him, looking up through the sandy curls that fell forward onto his forehead. “Look, if you don’t want to go, I get it. I really do. But I think… well, I think it’s important for James that we—“</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“I <em>know</em>,” replied Sirius, his tone hard and sharp. He turned his face from Remus, ashamed of speaking to him like that; they didn’t do that anymore, tried not to hurt one another with barbed words and veiled insults. They’d moved beyond it—or, at least, Sirius thought they had. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">The two of them stayed like that for a little longer, suspended together in the stillness and the dark. Sirius’ hands were clenched fists, nails digging into his palms, the sharp pricks against his skin welcome because it meant he felt something other than anger. Something other than <em>rage</em>. There was some third presence in that room, some heartbeat that seemed to pull them together, even when they tried to push each other away. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Come on,” Sirius said finally, pushing himself upright. “We should go, shouldn’t we?” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Remus rose to his feet and nodded. “Yeah, we should.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Sirius could feel Remus’ eyes boring into his back as he busied himself with finding his jacket; patting the pockets down once, and then once more. <em>Wallet, keys, wand</em>. The same ritual he always did before leaving the house. In the hall, he checked his reflection in the mirror and caught Remus' eye; hazel glowing in the amber of the candles. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">They looked at each other for a second before that connection was broken. Sirius turned away, and waved his hand so that the heavy bolts on the door slid out of place. Then, stepping off the front porch into the night air, they vanished.</span>
</p>
<hr/><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">The two men appeared with a <em>crack</em> alongside a low dry-stone wall. Ahead of them, a great, leaning yew tree stood, shadow upon shadow. They had apparated into that silver hour when the night began to blur into daybreak and everything was still shadowed and hazy. At the sound of twigs snapping underfoot in the darkness beneath the yew, they instinctively drew their wands.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“It’s me,” came James’ strong voice. Sirius and Remus lowered their wands a little, eyes boring into the darkness as James emerged from it. Despite the hazy violet light, he was instantly recognisable. The war had left its marks on him.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Morning,” smiled Remus, wand arm falling to his side. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Morning. Got here alright then?” James asked. Sirius offered him only a shrug and a grunt in return. The three of them turned and walked slowly through the shadows cast by the crumbling Norman church. Sirius glanced up at the tower. The clock above them was about to chime seven o’clock—far too early for them to be standing around in the cold October morning, he thought bitterly. Beside him, James and Remus talked in low voices. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Across the small, uneven land, past stones covered in lichen and moss, the three men walked, coming to a stop by the far hedge. The headstone in front of them was newer than most of those around them. The pale grey stone from which it was carved had no layer of green growing over it, softening its sharp edges; in the cold half-light, it almost glowed. Sirius wasn’t sure how long they stood there, irritation sounding beneath the membranes of his skin like music as they just stared. Finally—</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“I’ll…” James cleared his throat. “I’ll start, shall I?”</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Sirius looked away for a moment, eyes flicking around the graveyard. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“I had a baby,” James began, and then blustered a little. “Well, <em>I</em> didn’t have the baby, obviously, that was Lily, because I can’t have babies. Not like, I can’t have children in a philosophical sense, more the biological issue of—“</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Prongs.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Right,” muttered James, nodding at Remus’ interruption. “Right, yeah. What I meant is that Lily and I had another baby in the spring. Another boy. He’s a wee little thing still—“ James gestured with his hands only to realise there was no point. He curled up his hands and let them fall at his sides. “He’s called Johnny—well, John Sirius, after these two idiots. Harry’s besotted with him. Keeps covering him up with the invisibility cloak, though, which is damned awkward when you turn round and both the baby and your two-year-old have magically disappeared…” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">James’ laugh echoed in the quiet graveyard. Remus mustered a smile, nodding encouragingly for him to keep going; Sirius, however, looked away with a roll of his eyes. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Anyway, I just thought you should know, and all…” James trailed off.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">More silence. Sirius balled his hands into fists. Some of these graves were so old, he thought, he could just kick his feet against them and no one would know, could scuff his shoes against the rough lettering carved into them and send shooting pains up his legs, just to <em>feel</em> something other than rage.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“We, uh…” Remus cleared his throat. “Sirius and I are together. Weird, I know, but—“ he broke off with an awkward chuckle, glancing across to where Sirius still stood mulishly. “I guess the war taught us that sometimes, the most important things are right in front of us.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Obvious things matter,” James muttered.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Eh?” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“You know, like the idea that we don’t see the obvious things, because we usually perceive only what we want to see. I don’t know, Lily bought me this Muggle book of philosophy and there’s a lot of interesting things in it…” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Right…” replied Remus, nodding as his eyebrows knitted together in confusion. Eventually, he turned his gaze away from James and back to the grave before him. “After the war, we realised that there were too many things unsaid—between all of us, not just between Sirius and I, but… well, Sirius seemed the best place to start.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“About fucking time,” James grinned, and Remus knocked him with his shoulder.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Piss off, Prongs.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Both of them looked up at Sirius, grins still on their faces. He wished they wouldn’t. Sirius held onto pain, he always had; he cleaved to it, clutched it to his chest and wouldn’t let go because that was how he’d always been and that was what he’d always known. There’d been no childhood lessons about forgiveness at Walburga’s knee.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Pads,” nudged James gently. “Do you want to…”</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">He was doing this for James, Sirius reminded himself. James needed them to be standing at this grave in the early morning light, pouring their hearts out to a cold stone. Sirius didn’t understand that, but he knew that this was what his brother needed; and what James needed, Sirius would move mountains and part oceans and catch constellations in pursuit of. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“I miss you,” he finally bit out. He kicked at the tufts of grass near his feet. “I’m mad at myself for missing you, and I’m mad at <em>you </em>for… well, for <em>everything</em>. I’m so angry, Peter—“</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">The name clung to the back of Sirius’ throat. He realised, almost without meaning to, that it was the first time he’d called Peter by that name in so long. It had always been <em>Wormtail</em>, or <em>he.</em> It hadn’t been <em>Peter</em> since the last time they’d embraced, right before James and Lily went into hiding. And yet, that was what was carved on the gravestone in front of them: <em>Peter George Pettigrew, 1960-1981</em>. There was no epitaph, no dedication to Peter as friend or son or brother. Three words, two dates, one life summed up in the spaces in between. Sirius squeezed his eyes shut for a second, trying to come up with something meaningful.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Dumbledore thinks he’ll come back, you know.” It was Remus who broke the silence, the blanket of still sorrow that enveloped them. He stuffed his hands in his pockets and looked down at Peter’s headstone. “He thinks what you did… well, it wasn’t enough.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Will it ever be enough?” asked Sirius sharply. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">James looked at him, turning his head so that the slow, soft light of the nascent sunrise illuminated his face. One side of it was as it had always been: rosy cheeks, aquiline nose with a slight crookedness at the top from a bludger, sharp grey eyes. The other was the mark of that night, of Peter’s betrayal: fine white scars like electricity crackling across the skin from where the Avada Kedavra had hit. They stretched from James’ jawline, fractal patterns that meandered in a strangely beautiful patina across his cheek, up to his forehead and the crease beside his eye. Behind his glasses, one eye remained that clear, sharp grey, piercing in its gaze; the other was a milky white. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“I wouldn’t be alive without him, Pads,” James murmured. “If Peter hadn’t stepped between Voldemort and me…”</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Voldemort wouldn’t have bloody been there if he didn’t tell him!” Sirius hissed. He couldn’t understand it; James seemed resolute in ignoring the fact that without Peter breaking his Fidelus vow, without him telling Voldemort where James and Lily were… Sirius swallowed.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“I know,” replied James softly, and reached out a hand to squeeze Sirius’ shoulder. “But I think he paid the price for that mistake, don’t you?”</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Sirius didn’t know what to reply to that. He wanted to be like James—he wanted to trust in some great balance to the scales of the universe that saw wrongs righted, to let go of them when they were. Certainly, James hadn’t always been that way; the gentle, easy grace he had nowadays had lain dormant for a long time, only coaxed from its hiding place by war and the love of a good woman. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Sirius didn’t have that. He had good love, of course he did; Remus loved him honestly and loved him well. But sometimes, Sirius thought his heart was a tomb, inhabited by Peter, and Regulus, and Marlene, Dorcas, the Prewett brothers. So many bodies laid to rest, and no way to raise those bones. </span>
  <b></b>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">James’ gentle, low voice cracked the still morning air. “Ready?” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Yeah,” nodded Sirius, feeling James and Remus’ eyes on him. “Yeah, I’m ready.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“You should do it,” James said firmly. He placed a small leather case on the ground in front of the grave and looked expectantly at Sirius. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Prongs, you’re the one who nearly died, I think that—“</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">James shook his head. “Yeah, and now I look like the one-eyed witch statue, so I think I get to choose. I don’t want to. I want it to be you, Pads.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Sirius let out a shaky breath. He reached for his wand, only to stop and stuff it back into his pocket. He wanted to do this by hand, no magic. The grass was damp beneath his knees as Sirius knelt and fumbled with the buckles on the stiff leather, finally wrestling it open. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Four goblets were set into the velvet interior of the case. Sirius let his fingers trail over them for a second, feeling the intricate engraving in the cold metal against his skin. So many memories in these cups, he thought, so many painful, beautiful memories.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Pass me the wine, Prongs.”</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">The bottle was dusty, and Sirius noted the vintage as he brushed off the label. <em>1871. </em>He refrained from laughing, the first burst of joy he’d felt bubbling in his chest all morning—of course James would bring one of the best elf-made wine vintages in the past two centuries for this. It was so very <em>James. </em></span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Sirius tried to remember the last time he’d drunk this kind of wine. He wouldn’t let Remus bring elf-made wine into the house anymore; he couldn’t bear it being around, a constant memorial. It was the last drink the four of them had shared the night before James and Lily had been made to vanish from the face of the wizarding world. <em>The four of them</em>. He could hardly bear to think of them as the Marauders any longer. Sirius thought back to the final embrace he and James had shared before they went into hiding. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Go well, Sirius,” James had murmured into his ear. It was all Sirius could do not to sob into James’ strong shoulder. “When this is over—when we’ve defeated him—we’ll celebrate. Don’t be reckless, Padfoot; I want to sit beside you at the feast, my friend.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">This wasn’t the kind of celebration any of them had imagined. Perhaps selfishly—and most certainly arrogantly—Sirius had thought he’d be the one to finish off Voldemort. He used to play out the scene in his mind late at night when he couldn’t sleep; he’d be standing in front of Lily and James’ cottage, yelling at them over his shoulder. <em>It’s him!</em> <em>Run! Go! I’ll hold him off! </em>There’d be some barrage of spells from his right, and he’d duck as he fired back at the Death Eaters lurking in the shadows. They were always in the shadows, save for one face: a pale, thin face with grey eyes and dark curls falling forward onto a forehead, so like his own. <em>Regulus’ face. </em></span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Sirius had imagined he’d shoot his one-and-only Avada Kedavra at Voldemort. It’d hit him square in the chest, and he’d fall back, and Sirius would watch the light go from his eyes. There was always silence just afterwards, one collective intake of breath by everyone present. Sirius couldn’t ever imagine what would happen next; his daydreams became blurred and fuzzy after that. He certainly hadn’t envisioned that he, Remus and James would be standing around a grave drinking before sunrise, and that none of them had made it out whole. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“It’s wine, Pete. You always hated firewhisky,” murmured Sirius. He uncorked the bottle and, with a hand that shook more than he would have liked, poured a generous measure into each of the cups. He handed the appropriate cups to James and Remus and then nestled Peter’s against the headstone. It keeled to one side a little and the wine splashed onto the grey stone like droplets of blood.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Sirius took his own cup and pushed himself up, his knees protesting as he did so. He lifted his cup and looked down at the headstone. “To…” Sirius stopped with a sigh. What to say? <em>Here’s to you, Peter, for betraying us and saving us? Here’s to you, Peter, for broken people and broken friendships? </em></span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Here’s to you, Peter,” Sirius said finally, resolution in each syllable. “To friendship… and to forgiveness.” He didn’t add the end of what he was thinking: <em>to forgiveness. Maybe one day I’ll find it. </em></span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">Lifting his cup to his lips, Sirius took a drink of the rich ruby liquid. Some of it slipped out the corner of his mouth, a line running down his chin to the sharp cliff of his jaw and onto his neck. He glanced at James and Remus downing their own glasses. The light was breaking sharp across their faces. They looked old, Sirius thought, far older than their twenty-two years. James’ scars looked worse in the sun, and there were, as ever, the dark circles under Remus’ eyes that heralded the waxing of the moon. No matter their ageing, some things never changed.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">They stayed there for half an hour or so, sharing another glass of the delicious red liquid. Somewhere high in the tree above them, a blackbird let out its call and they made some collective, silent decision that the spell had been broken, the wine had been drunk, and it was time to go. Remus muttered a gentle cleaning charm on their goblets as James vanished the wine in Peter’s cup. They were packed back into their little case that was then stowed under James’ arm, a neat ritual that was so very familiar to Sirius, so very painful. There was then an awkward moment when all was tidied and the grave looked better than it had before they’d arrived that they realised it was time to leave. Sirius grimaced. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Until next year?” Remus asked, threading his arm though Sirius’. </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">James shook his head. “No,” he replied, “I don’t think I need to come back again.” He reached a hand up to tap lightly against the scars on his face. “I’ve got a memorial I carry with me, remember?” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">They wandered slowly back through the graveyard, smiling at the small group of Muggles gathered in the porch at the front door for a service. It promised to be one of those autumn mornings when the world seemed paused on its axis for just a brief hour or two, and life was suspended while the silver hour of dawn gave way to golden sunlight glittering on the frosted ground.</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“You coming back to Peverell?” James asked as they slipped through the gate. After that night and the destruction of the cottage at Godric’s Hollow, he and Lily had moved back into his childhood home. They’d pulled back the sheets on the furniture at Peverell Hall, and made a new life in the clouds of dust. “Lily promised cooked breakfast.”</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Sure,” Sirius smiled. “It’d be good to see the boys.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Harry’s been asking for you, both of you. We’ve got some news, you see.” </span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Prongs…” Sirius said slowly. “Do not tell me you’re having another baby.”</span>
</p><p class="p1">
  <span class="s1">“Well…” </span>
</p>
  </div><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_foot_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff"><p>The inspiration for this fic comes from a line in an Elbow song called My Sad Captains. Guy Garvey talks about it being a drinking anthem to friendship. If you haven’t heard it, give it a listen and let your soul be broken and beautified in it all. </p><p>The architect of infamy<br/>Oh my soul<br/>For each and every train we missed<br/>Oh my soul<br/>A bitter little Eucharist<br/>Oh my soul</p><p>Oh, long before<br/>You and I were born<br/>Others beat these benches with their empty cups<br/>To the night and its stars<br/>To be here, and now, and who we are</p><p>Another sunrise with my sad captains<br/>With who I choose to lose my mind<br/>And if it's all we only pass this way but once<br/>What a perfect waste of time</p></blockquote></div></div>
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